


Los Enamorados

by LanaDelJones



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: F/M, Southside Serpent Jughead Jones, surprise! the serpents are a coven
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-15
Updated: 2019-08-22
Packaged: 2020-05-12 03:51:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19220986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LanaDelJones/pseuds/LanaDelJones
Summary: Betty always believed in magic.She loved it, but also held a bitter grudge towards it.You see, magic took away her best friend.That faithful day, her beanie wearing best friend opened her eyes to the supernatural. Watching Jughead's hand on top of her bloodied arm and seeing the soft glow grow between them filled her with excitement. But much too soon the icy chill of reality settled in.Because in Riverdale, magic was a death sentence.Ever since the madness made its way over from Greendale, you never dared uttered the word witch. And it was because of this that the day Jughead healed her was also the last time she's send him.When news broke that Southside High was merging with Riverdale High, Betty couldn't help a flutter of hope. Would he still remember me? Did he missed her? She wonders how much his powers have grown over the years.Her scar on her arm starts to feel hot before she even sees him. Once she turns around a green eyes lock on blue a icy chill goes down her spine. If the scowl on his face was any indication, this was going to be one hell of a long school year.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi!  
> Welcome to my story, I've had this idea stuck in my head for ages and just decided to give this a chance.
> 
> This is my first time writing anything for the fandom and I'm both excited and nervous.

     Betty always believed in magic.

     Ever since she was a little girl, she would sit on her bench seat in her bedroom and stare off into the woods that surrounded her house. She loved the quiet energy that radiated from the woods, and the feel of the cool wispy fog against her skin. Betty knew that there was something magical hidden deep in the heart of the moss-covered trees, she just needed to find a way into that world.

     Yes, Betty Cooper was a firm believe in magic, but she also held a bitter resentment towards it. You see, magic took away her best friend.

     On that fateful misty day, her beanie wearing best friend opened her eyes to the supernatural. It was an ordinary day for Betty, she spent her Saturday morning eating pancakes and watching cartoons. She was so comfy on the couch that she almost forgets she was supposed to meet Jughead soon to play. She rushes upstairs to get changed quickly, peeking outside to see that light mist swirling outside her window. Betty smiles a big toothy grin, today she gets to wear her new pink rubber rain boots.

     The ground makes a soft squishy noise while Betty walks to the Fox Forest hiking trail to meet her best friend. And as always, there he is waiting for her, knitted crown on top of his head and his inky black curls covering his forehead.

     “Cool boots” he says with an all too familiar smirk on his face. Betty just rolls her eyes and shoots him a small smile.

     They start to play tag among the trees, just off the hiking trail, after Betty is red in the face, she finds a giant puddle and an idea pops in her head. “come on Juggie!” she squeals as she runs full force towards the water. Jughead laughs softly and shakes his head slightly at the sight before him, perfect Betty Cooper was knee deep in a puddle and jumping around like a crazy person.

     “Easy there, Betts” he laughs as he sits on a rock near the puddle.

     “Why?” Betty asks turning to face him “since when are you afraid to get a little dirty?”

     Jughead smiles and rolls his eyes playfully “the only thing I’m afraid of right now is the wrath of Alice Cooper” He tilts his head to the side, causing some unruly hair to fall into his eyes, when he notices Betty looked down and shrugged her shoulders at the mention of her mother “what’s the matter Betts”

     Betty turns her back towards him and lets out a deep sigh “its not like she will even be home to see me all dirty” she then quickly looks down and starts distracting herself with a loose thread from her shirt. Jughead with big eyes quickly stands up and moves so he can see Betty's face “what does that mean exactly? Is she out of the house a lot nowadays?”

     Betty is relieved she doesn’t see pity in his eyes when she finally looks at him “yeah, ever since my dad left for his work retreat she is hardly ever home” Jughead sighs and walks closer to the puddle and leans his head down a little to make him eye level with her.

     “You know you are never really alone right? Just say the word and I’ll be there to keep you company” he notices she tries to look off to the side of his face so he moves along to follow her “its you and me, cooper, we’re in this together”

     Betty stares at him and gives him the tiniest of nods, Jughead smiles slightly “you’re stuck with me” which earned him a small laugh from Betty. Jughead considers this a small victory.

     Betty stares down at the murky water and smiles to herself when she sees now dirty her pants had got, it was a freeing feeling knowing that she won’t get lectured when she gets home. She threw her head back letting the sun peaked out from behind a cloud warm her face while she spun around in small circles. She doesn’t notice jughead crouched down just off to the side looking carefully over the wildflowers that grew along the forest floor. After about four or five spins Betty feels lightheaded and decides her puddle time has come to an end, making big splashes as she stomps out of the puddle to lay back on the moss. Betty closes her eyes with a smile on her face as she thinks about what she is going to make for dinner once she gets home.

     The sun goes back to hiding behind the clouds and a slight breeze starts to pick up around them, a shiver moves up her back as she sits up and looks towards Jughead. He is sitting with this back towards her with his head down, Betty moves to her feet and walks towards him. She notices that he is concentrating on something, so she walks up to him slowly and kneels in front of him.

     Jughead, startled, looks up quick and smiles big for Betty “I made you something” and he slowly raises his hands up to their eye level.

     Betty looks down and her eyes go big “how do you know how to make these?” her eyes taking in all the colors of each flower that was woven together.

     “My mom taught me, and Jelly always asks me to make them for her” he shrugged his shoulders and starts to lift his arms over her head.

     “There” he says once the flower crown rest atop her blonde messy waves, “now we can both have our own crowns” he says with a gentle tug to secure it on her head. Betty gingerly reaches a hand up towards her gift, letting her fingers touch the silky colorful petals.

     “Thank you” she says softly to him with bright big eyes, quickly throwing her arms around him, “this is the nicest thing I’ve ever gotten” he returned the hug until he felt her shiver. “come on, let's get going” he says lowering his arms and getting to his feet.

      As they make their way back to the hiking trail that lead them back out of the woods, Betty's rubber boots slipped on a rock she was climbing over and didn’t have enough time to try and brace herself for the fall. She fell with a heavy thud, pain immediately shooting through her body from her arm. Betty looked down and all she saw was red.

      Bright red blood covered her lower arm and stained the moss that surrounded her, she noticed a large gash in the center of her forearm. Betty was feeling a little woozy the longer she looked at the thick blood that was oozing out, so she looked over her shoulder to see where Jughead was. All she could see was the very top of his knitted cap climbing over the rocks to reach her. “Betts what happened!” he said was he was moving closer.

      His eyes grew wide at what was before him, his best friend on the verge of crying with a bloody arm. “what did you even cut your arm on?” he said while frantically looking around to see if he could spot a sharp looking rock.

      “Does it matter?” she retorts as she slowly tries to sit herself up. She tries to move her hurt arm and a loud hiss escapes her mouth when she put too much pressure on it. “easy there, let me take a look” he stops her and moves to sit in front of her.

      “It really hurts, Juggie” she says with a sniff. Its bad, that much he knew, how she managed to cut her arm this deeply was beyond his understanding. But what he did know was that he needed to think of a plan and move fast.

      Betty’s eyes grew heavy and she watched Jughead look over her arm, the wind had picked up around them and she was freezing, no longer trying to hide her shivers. She watches Jughead get more and more frustrated as he tries and fails to wrap her arm with bits of the blanket he tore to stop the bleeding. His hands start to shake slightly after the third wrap gets soaked through.

      “Its not going to stop bleeding, we need to just start walking back to town” she says with a quiet voice. “we need to stop this bleeding first” as he attempts with the next wrap and quickly clenches his jaw when he sees the bright red being to spread across the cloth.

      “I can barely keep my eyes open Jughead, so unless you want to carry me out of these woods, I suggest you help me up and we start walking”.

      Jughead tries taking a couple of steps with Betty with his arm around her to help keep her upright, when suddenly her knees buckle, and they are both taken down. Jughead takes one look at the blonde to his side and takes a deep breath and knows what he is going to have to do.

      “Here, don’t move too much, just sit upright for him and hold your arm out for me. Ok?” Betty gives him a questioning look while Jughead moves behind her and shrugs out of his jacket and drapes it over her shoulders.

       “What are you doing?” He quickly moves to sit on his knees close in front of better “just trust me, I know how to fix this” he looks around nervously, takes a deep breath and lays his hands facing up next to Betty’s.

       “Do you trust me, Betts?” She stares into his blue eyes for a moment then slowly moves her good hand on top “of course I do” he squeezes her hand and she smile softly to him “were in this together”

        Betty watches with big eyes as Jughead moves his hands from hers, closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. He then placed his hands on top of her bloodied forearm and Betty watched as his lips moved ever so slightly as if he was speaking to himself. The wind picked up and a shiver ran up her spine causing her to move her arm slightly away from Jughead, his hands held her arm firmly and ever so gently one of his thumbs rub her skin softly.

        Betty was starting to feel silly as she glanced up to the quickly darkening sky, she noticed the dark clouds making their way over to them. Betty was distracting herself by counting how many stars she can see when she suddenly felt it. Warmth.

        A cozy warmth started to radiate from her open wound and travel throughout her body, she closed her eyes and couldn’t help but let out a content hum of approval. When she opened her eyes a soft glow of light could be seen from the corner of her eye and when she moved her head towards it Betty couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

        A soft yellow glow of warm light was between Jughead and herself, she looked over to see that his eyes were still shut, and he was still silently moving his lips. She then looked down to her arm and a slight gasp escaped her, almost all the blood was gone, and the once large deep gash was now the size of a paper cut. Betty watched as the paper cut slowly sealed itself, only leaving a raised silvery white scar. She felt Jughead slowly swipe his thumb over the scar and then opened his eyes and gave her a nervous smile.

        Jughead was beyond nervous about how Betty would react to this news, but before his mind could wander off to the worst-case scenario, he was distracted by the blonde in front of him. Her big green eyes were illuminated by the glow his healing spell casted, and she had a smudge of dirty on her cheek. But the most distracting was the slightly crooked flower crown on top of her wild messy blonde curls.

        Once her wound was healed the yellow light between them faded into nothingness Jughead looked down and clenched his fist a couple of times to keep them from cramping. He looks up and locks eyes with Betty and is surprised to see the grin on her face, she looks ecstatic and just as she opens her mouth to speak, they both hear it.

        Loud footsteps and twigs snapping and loud voices of men shouting, Jughead quickly rises to his feet and helps Betty to stand as well. His eyes are wide as he looks around them, “we need to move fast, if we want to catch that witch” the men shout and his blood runs cold. Just as panic was about to set in, he feels a small warm hand grab his and tugs him towards the trail “hurry Jughead! we can outrun them” she whispers, and they start to run their way towards the trail.

        They move as quickly as they can without alerting the men in the woods their whereabouts, and don’t try to speak to one another until they are in the safety of Betty’s home. Both of their heartbeats racing as they power through the trail getting closer and closer to the main road. Neither one realizes they are still holding hands until they reach the main road. Sitting under one of the streetlights, feet on either side of his motorcycle, was Jughead's dad.

        “Boy, you really fucked up” he said with growl. Betty could feel the boy besides him tense up.

        “We _got_ to go, now” he says moving a helmet towards his son.

         Betty can hear some commotion going on a little down the trail, meaning whoever was following them was getting closer and they needed to move. “he’s right, you got to get out of here and get somewhere safe” she reaches out to the helmet FP is holding and turns to face her best friend with one of her eyebrows raised.

         “I’m not just going to leave you here in danger” Jughead says looking between her and his dad “don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine” she smiles and hands him the helmet. He moves closer to her and with a low voice says “I wanted to talk to you about what happened” she gives him a big smile.

         “We can talk all about it over a milkshake at pops tomorrow” He gave her a nod and moved past her towards the motorcycle, he noticed the sad look in his father’s eyes. Before he could question his father on his odd look he is being swung around and hugged tightly for the second time that day. He quickly moves his arms around the small frame of the pretty blonde with the lopsided flower crown, “thank you” she says quietly so only he would head, he gave her one last squeeze before letting go and moving down the street and out of sight.

        Betty sat at a booth in Pop’s for going on almost 4 hours, she sighed and moved her head to gaze out the window. Hoping to catch a glimpse of a black hair or hear the low rumble of a motorcycle. So far, no sign of him anywhere. she was starting to worry, what if the men in the woods caught up to him and FP? With a sigh and slouching further down the booth Betty cursed this sleepy little town.

        Because in Riverdale, magic was a death sentence. And no one ever dared to utter the word witch. The madness started in the next town over in Greendale, when over a dozen men and women were accused of witchcraft and sentenced to death. it was beyond foolish to Betty when she was reading up in the dusty history book in the town library, it had happened a couple of years before Betty was even born. And since the infamous Spellman trials no one else has been accused or put to trial, but thinking back to the multiple men in the woods gave Betty a sinking feeling deep in her gut.

        Rain began to fall lightly against the windows of pop’s and Betty tries to hold back her tears as she stands up and moves towards the door. Pop is wiping down the counter by the cash register and gives Betty a sad little smile “don’t worry too much Betty dear, I’m sure Jughead is just fine love” Betty stops her movement and turns to look at pop. “thanks pop, if he comes in later today can you let him know I was here?” After pop nods his head and bids Betty a goodnight, she makes her way down towards her home. She decided to take the long way home, just so she could walk down Jughead’s road and maybe see him there.

        As she was moving closer and closer to the Jones’ robin egg blue house Betty noticed the moving van that was parked in front. Next, she noticed that all the lights were off inside and it looked like most of the stuff was already moved out. She caught sight of an older looking gentleman moving a cardboard box into the back of the van. Betty walked up and tried to put on a friendly smile.

       “Hello there” the man turned towards her and gave her a slight head nod. “Do you happen to know where the people living here are moving to?” she asked while batting her eyes towards the man. “Oh, didn’t you hear? they are off to the Southisde” he replied gruffly. Betty tried to control her breathing, closing her eyes and curling her hands into tight fists, she tells the man thank you and quickly walks away.

        Betty allowed a few tears to escape her eyes, letting them mix with the light rain that was falling. She cried herself to sleep that night, over the empty quiet house she came home to, the broken family that faced her when she gazed to the framed picture on her bedside table. But mostly she cried for her beanie wearing best friend. She cried for him because deep down, Betty knew that she was never going to see him ever again.

        The slamming of a locker close to her jolted Betty out of her reverie, sighing to herself she starts to pull out the books she needed for her first period class. The hallway was obnoxiously loud with gossip and students talking about what they had been up to during summer vacation.  When news broke out a couple of days before the school year that Southside High finally shut down and the students were being transferred to Riverdale High, it received mixed reviews.

        Some people, mostly the jocks, were very against the whole idea and the other half didn’t really seem to mind at all. Betty found overthinking about the upcoming merger, no matter how many times she tried to distract herself from it, her mind always ended up wandering. Betty started to feel the soft fluttering of hope building up in her chest and she’s trying and failing to put a stop to them.

Will he remember her? Does he miss her? Betty sighs to herself as she grabs the last book out of her locker and close the door. _Get a grip, Betty_ she thinks to herself. She’s sure he would still remember her, it’s only been seven years. When Betty thinks of the second question that’s been stuck in her head she feels her heart starts to beat a little faster. She hopes that he missed her, but she wasn’t too sure if he did. Surely, if he did miss her he would have at least come around to see her.  

        Betty’s phone vibrates in her jean pocket, she leaned against her locker and pulls the cellphone out to check out what new text message she received. After agreeing to wait for Kevin by her locker she beings to mindlessly scroll through her various social media accounts until her gossip queen friend comes to meet her. Eyes trained on her phone, Betty nearly drops it when an unexpected jolt shoots through her forearm. After looking around to make sure no one around noticed her, she turns her arm with her hand facing up and looks are the silver white jagged scar. To Betty her scar resembles a lightning bolt, but when she’s mentioned this before to Kevin he just shrugged his shoulders and told her “it just looks like a weird scar to me, Betty” Throughout the years she would get random sensations from her scar, sometimes a warming sensation much like that day when Jughead healed her to sometimes a burning feeling.

        But today was different, she’s never felt this before coming from her scar. She’s never jumped from the sensation, it was usually subtle and she would be able to mask her face and act like nothing was wrong. But right now, in the school hallway her forearm is on _fire._

Betty tries in vain to try and rub the pain away, but she can feel the literal heat radiating from it. With eyes still strained on her arm, Betty missed the loud bang of the front doors of Riverdale High being kicked opened and a sea of leather jackets start to make their way inside and down the hallways. Betty looks up when she noticed the usual noisy hallway was now eerily quiet, with her hand still covering her scar Betty looks up just as Jughead waltzes in through the door.

         Green eyes locked with ocean blue eyes, Betty didn’t think she could look away even if she tried. _I wonder how much his powers have grown since that day in the woods._ Betty shakes her head to get that thought out of her mind.

         Betty is still staring, noticing the subtle changes to his once familiar face, until one of his friends clapped him on the back and he starts to blink and turn to smirk at the friend. Once his friend walks away Jughead turns to look back at Betty, only this time, his face has the coldest scowl she has ever seen on him.

         Betty’s eyes widen at how lethal his look is, and her arms start to get goosebumps, Betty doesn’t realize it but she starts to run her fingers across her forearm to try and self soothe herself.

         Jughead’s eyes travel down to her hands and he pauses for just a moment, Betty’s hands freeze in place once she followed his line of sight. Jughead looks up to her face once last time, narrows his eyes and turns and saunters further down the hallway.

 _Fuck._ She thinks to herself, this is going to be one hell of a school year.

  
  
  



	2. Chapter 2

Jughead knew seeing her this morning was going to be hard, but fuck, he didn’t think it would be this difficult. Once their eyes locked he could feel the slight tug that pulled between them. He wasn’t sure if the pull was from two friends who haven’t seen each other in years, or if it the cause was otherworldly.He didn’t know that performing that little healing spell on her had consequences, that it would flip his world right on it’s head. 

All that was running through Jughead’s mind that day was to help Betty and to take her pain away.. He had no idea that the section of the woods they were in was monitored, heavily, by witch hunters. He had no idea that his quick impulse sitting on the damp forest floor was going to rip his family out of the Northside and exile them to the Southside. He knew the dangers of being what he was in this sleepy little town, his father just failed to mention to him just how serious the threat was. 

He wasn’t able to make out the look in his father’s eyes when Betty gave him that final hug, but he noticed that he couldn’t quite take his eyes off of her newly formed scar. Once on the back of the bike he gave her one last look and smiled to himself. Betty still had on her flower crown he made her, sitting a little crookedly on her messy curls, with a small smile on her face.

Jughead didn’t expect to walk into his home to find his mother in a frantic state throwing whatever was in her reach into boxes of various sizes. 

“What were you thinking Jug?” she said with a crazed look in her eyes. 

“I needed to help her, there was so much blood everywhere.” 

She set a box down, rather forcibly, and moved quickly towards him. She grabbed his arm, he could feel her sharp nails against his skin.

“Your foolishness just cost us everything” her grip began to tighten. “Now you and your father will have to move to some tin can on the southside”

Jughead looked at her confused “what do you mean? Where are you and jellybean going?” He watched as she loosened her grip and walked back over to her boxes. 

“We are getting out of this town” she raised her head, eyes darting between Jughead and FP “we are moving to Toledo, we don’t belong here”

Jughead’s mind was reeling, he had a feeling his mother has been looking for a way out. Between the screaming matches he hears between his parents and the faraway look in her eyes when she stared out of the window. He knew sooner or later she was going to leave, he just never thought she would want to take his little sister with her. 

His mother moved quickly packing her and Jellybean’s things. Jughead’s eyes began to water when he watched her place the last box in the back of their old beat up pickup truck. He clenched his jaw to wield himself from letting any of the tears to fall from his eyes. Gladys turns around slowly from the bed of the truck with an unreadable look on her face. 

She grabs onto the lapels of his leather jacket tight and looks him right in the eyes “you need to be smart now, boy, and remember to think with your head and not your heart” Jughead tries to take a step back from her, but she releases her grip on his jacket and moves her hands to the sides of his face. 

“You need to learn that in order to protect the ones that we hold close to our hearts, that sometimes we need to keep them away” Jughead feels his throat starts to tighten, she can’t possibly be talking about Betty. 

“The best thing you can do now for the both of you is to stay away from her” Jughead watches her eyes grow colder with each word. “Don’t pull her into this world, it only ends one way” he watches her eyes move toward where his father was standing “with anger, resentment, and heartbreak”

The two Jones men stand on the sidewalk and watched the truck carrying the other half of their family move down the street until it turned and was completely out of sight. With a sigh Fp moves his hand to Jughead’s shoulder “I’m sorry son, one day you will understand” his gave one small squeeze before removing it “we need to get going, we can’t sleep here tonight”

The drive down to the Southside seemed to take forever, and with each passing minute Jughead felt his anger grow higher and higher. The only sound filling the cab of the car was the cracking of his knuckles. When they finally pulled up to their new home, a dented trailer, Jughead didn’t even wait for Fp to turn off the car before he was out and slamming the car door with as much force he could muster. 

With clenched fist he stomps up the steps and jerks the door open and steps inside, he looks around at the sad state this trailer was in. Fp steps inside with a duffle bag and a box in his hands and moves to set it on the small kitchen table “your room will be all the way down the hall” Jughead just turns to glare at him.

“Dad, what are we even doing here? Why aren’t we at home right now?”

“Because boy, in case you didn’t notice from your little adventure this afternoon in the woods. You nearly blew your cover and got caught. And even worse, you almost got Betty caught up in this mess as well”

Jughead crosses his arms across his chest “but we didn’t get caught! And it didn’t even phase Betty when she realized what I am. You know her dad, she always had a love for magic. I’ve been convinced for awhile now that she had already figured it out and was just too polite to confront me about it” he said with a small smile on his face.

Fp sighs angrily “you just don’t get it do you boy? You almost died today Jug, you almost got Betty killed. Also, didn’t you find it strange how quickly those hunters were able to detect you?” That last question had Jughead high on alert “what are you insinuating? That I was being followed?”

Fp pulls out a chair and sits down “maybe not followed, maybe someone tipped off the hunters. Maybe someone was working with the hunters and planned a set up” Jughead couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Are you seriously trying to tell me that you think Betty, of all people, was working with the hunters?”

With sad eyes Fp looks straight at Jughead “tell me, what exactly did Betty fall on that cause such a bad cut on her arm? Whatever it was had to be really sharp to cut her so deeply that it required immediate attention. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never come across a rock that sharp before”

Jughead could feel his heart beating in his ears “there’s no way she was working with them, she was the one who got me to get up and start moving towards the trail and out of danger.” This was crazy he thought to himself, Betty was the clumsiest person he’s ever met, if anyone was to find the sharpest rock in the middle of nowhere, it would be her. 

“Listen, I know today has been a lot” Jughead rolls his eyes and Fp just gives him an annoyed stare before continuing “but It’s time for you to wise up, you need to stay on this side of town for now on. This is our home now.. It’s time for you to get serious about your training, you want to be the next leader of this cover? Then you need to start acting like it”

Jughead took a deep breath and sat in the chair across from Fp, he knew he was the next in line to lead the coven. He grew up knowing the serpents vaguely, Gladys never allowed them over to their house and whenever his father went down to meet him he was never allowed to tag along. He knew sooner or later the serpent prince was needed to let his presence known in the Southside. 

“You need to listen to me, I know it’s going to be hard but you absolutely have to keep away from Betty” Fp reaches across the table to place his hands on top of his sons “you need to keep your distance to protect yourself and more importantly to protect her” He hold on his hands slightly tightens “there’s a storm brewing, these hunters are hungry for a war. The best thing you can do for her now is to not get her mixed up into this”

Jughead lowers his head in defeat “okay dad, I understand” He could never get Betty tangled up in this mess, and he would never forgive himself if she got hurt due to his selfishness. 

Later that night while Jughead laid in his bed, he started to go over the events of the day and his next plans of action. While he promised his dad he would cut off all ties with Betty, he still wanted to protect her from afar. Maybe it was just to keep his best friend safe, or to make sure she wasn’t in fact working with the hunters. 

The next following weeks moved in a blur for Jughead, most of his time was spent at the White Wyrm meeting all the other Serpents. He was surprised to realize there were quite a few members his age, It made his transition to the new school easy. When he wasn’t spending his time at school or at the Wyrm Jughead was moving through the shadows trying to catch a glimpse of golden blonde hair. 

Jughead observed Betty doing various things, Having a milkshake at Pop’s, reading a book curled up in her favorite seat at the local library, and of course walking down a hiking trail. To any outsider they would think everything was fine in Betty’s world, but Jughead knew better than most. He could tell by slightly purple bags under her sad green eyes that she was not her normal happy self. And it was all because of him. 

The guilt weighed heavily in Jughead’s stomach, here she was looking miserable and down on the Southside of town he was looking forward to his daily pool match with Joaquin and Sweet Pea after school. 

One night Jughead lost track of time at the Wrym, between the important Serpent meeting and a rather entertaining game of pool between Toni and Fangs he had completely forgot to check on Betty. He felt awful once the realization dawned on him, he left the bar in a rush with the excuse of homework on his tongue and Elm street set in his sights.

He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw Betty sitting at her bedroom window. He noticed the sad shake of her shoulders when he realized that she was crying. He decided that he needed to try and help her. With his eyes on the full moon and a small smile on his lips he knew just the thing, he started making his way to the trailer to gather the things he needed. 

 

Jughead sat back and sighed. With one hand still placed on the very old pages of the ancient book. He watches the flames from the candles dance ever so slightly.

Jughead raises his head to look up to the twinkling stars, the wind lightly moving his hair. He closes his eyes, waiting to hear the sign that the guardian he summoned was near. 

He hears a rustling of to the side of him, but when he turns his head to greet the ancient protector he lets out a scoff.

He didn't expect to see this tiny little ball of black fur. How was this kitten supposed to protect Betty?

He watches the tiny little thing make her way over to him, practically falling over when a gust of wind blows through.

As if knowing she's being made fun of, the kitten headbutts Jughead's hand then stares at him with an unamused face.

"sorry, sorry" Jughead mumbles, knowing better than to insult them.

The little fluff, as if accepting his apology, starts to rub her side against his hand.

Well, he thinks to himself, a cat would be a better fit for Betty than a big dog.

He tries to picture the pinched face of Alice Cooper once she sees Betty holding this black little thing. He laughs to himself thinking how out of place she will look in Betty's pink bedroom. It's perfect.

Looking down, petting the soft black fur he says gently "I have a very important job for you, little one"

Jughead was glad to see the smile slowly make its way back to Betty.On occasion he would see Betty talking to her new cat through her bedroom window. He was glad the little black furball brought so much love and joy back to her life. 

And that was how the years went by, Betty moving on while Jughead watched from the shadows. But now there were no shadows for him to hide in now that they were both at the same school. After he managed to escape the spell of Betty’s green eyes he makes his way over to the small gathering of leather jackets. 

Before much could be said the bell rings and Jughead walks leisurely down the hallway, the other students avoiding being in his path. First stop is the office to grab his schedule, Jughead thinks, he silently hopes he doesn’t share any classes with a certain blonde. He hopes his cold demeanor was enough to convince her to keep her distance.

He enters the stuffy office and gives the older lady sitting behind the desk a half smile. “Oh, you must be here to collect your schedule. Name please” Jughead had to lower his body just in order to make out what her soft voice was saying. 

“Last name Jones” he replies in a low clear voice.

“Ah, yes, I have it right Mr. Jones” he watches her eyes go wide behind her thick spectacles “my, what a lovely name you have” she says in a sigh “you never see kids these days with distinguished names” Jughead quickly snorts and he faintly hears a girly giggle behind him towards the door.

“Oh perfect timing, Elizabeth, i just gave Mr. Jones his schedule and he is all ready for you to give him the school tour and show him around” the secretary says warmly between looking between the two teens.

Jughead closes his eyes, he knows exactly who is standing behind him and he is quickly going over his options. As he turns around what he sees catches him off guard, leaning up against the door frame with a familiar smile on her lips he watches Betty’s eyes travel up his body and lands on his face. 

“So, Mr. Jones, shall we begin?”

Fuck, he thinks to himself, staying away from her is going to be damn near impossible.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi
> 
> Today's been one of those days. Been in my head all day about this chapter. So apologies if it's meh 😅

_Oh my god, what was that?_

_I really need to let Veronica give me some pointers_

_Because seriously, what the fuck?_

 

Betty couldn’t believe the words that just spilled out of her mouth,with wide eyes she quickly turns and walks out into the hallway. She closed her eyes and silently wished the flush on her cheeks would fade away before anyone could notice. She opened her eyes and steadied her breathing when she heard his footsteps stop behind her. With a slight turn of her head she gives him a polite smile and looked down at the paper containing his class schedule in his hands. After a few moments the paper was lifted towards her and she took it from him and they both began to silently walk down the corridor together.

 

At a quick glance Betty curses to herself when she realizes that he has quite a few of the same classes as her. As they make the first left turn and start towards the science labs Betty opens her mouth to attempt to make small talk when suddenly Jughead stops walking and holds up a hand “just, don’t Betty” he says with a sigh “i know you must think that things will be different now that i'm going to school here, but things have to stay the same”

Betty takes a step back and crossed her arms over her chest “I didn't know you could read minds now, how could you possibly know what i’m thinking when you haven’t seen me in years” she sees Jughead start to open his mouth and decides to give him a taste of his own medicine.

“Don’t bother, you don’t need to spare me any kind of explanation. Your actions speak louder than words” she squares her shoulders and faces him. “You left without even saying goodbye.You stood me up at Pop’s the following day after the woods. You couldn’t even be bothered to phone me or even write me a letter explaining what the fuck was even happening”

Betty didn’t even notice that with each sentence she was taking a step closer and closer to Jughead. She was so close now that she could smell that familiar smell of him, only now she noticed it’s mixed with a hint of cigarette smoke. Pushing that thought out of her mind she focuses on the boy in the beanie in front of her.

“That day you told me that we were in this together, then you just upped and abandoned me. So don’t you worry, Jughead Jones, I’m not tripping over myself to try and be your friend again” she finished her statement with a sharp jab of her finger in his broad shoulder. She tries the ignore the odd sensation she feels the moment her finger touched him, she lowers her hand and takes several steps back.

With downcast eyes she tries to control her emotions,the last thing she wants to do right now is to let a few tears escape her eyes in front of him. With the comforting clench of her fist to steady herself she raises her eyes and focuses them on the well worn familiar knitted cap.

“I just” she beings but her words gets stuck and she closes her eyes over her voices betrayal. Feeling the blush start to bloom over her cheeks, she knew that she needed to walk away from this situation and save herself from any more humiliation. She opens her eyes, pleased that no tears have fallen and with a quiet voice asks “why, Jughead?”  
Silence fills the space between them, the pounding in her ears is almost deafening. Looking up to the old clock mounted on the wall she notices that first period is almost over, so she grips her backpack strap and turns to walk away. After a few moments she hears footsteps approaching her and a warm arm touch her elbow, she turns around preparing for another heated conversation.

But what she saw when she turned around was not what she was expecting, instead of a cold and distant face she saw a face in turmoil. She could see the deep groove between his brows and noticed the blue storm in his eyes reflected the internal struggle he was currently in. she always remembered how expressive his eyes were when they were younger and she was pleased to see that they still were. She quickly saw relief staring back at her, probably for stopping and giving him a chance to explain himself, Betty reasoned to herself. Then a flash of guilt streaked his eyes that was quickly replaced with sadness.

A prickling sensation in her arm takes her out of her daze, and as she rubs her arm she raises one eyebrow to Jughead. “Please believe me when I say that I’m sorry for how I handled things. It was never my intention to hurt you the way I did” he says in a low sincere voice.

He looks down and watches curiously as she rubs her scar absentmindedly “as cliche as it sounds, I truly did what I did to protect you”

“And what exactly would I need to be protected from?”

“You can’t possibly be serious right now, you can’t think of a single thing or event that happened that could have landed you into some hot water?”

Just as Betty was about to respond back the bell rings loudly and almost immediately the slamming of doors and footsteps surround them. Realizing that this over packed hallway was not the best place to continue the conversation she immediately thinks of a quiet secluded place. Grabbing his hand before the large group of students were heading right in their direction they start to make their way to the Blue & Gold.

Opening the door and smiling at the familiar room she makes her way over to her work space and takes a seat on top of her dresser. She watches Jughead shuffle his feet nervously while he takes in the new room. “This school has Its own newspaper?”

“Yup, it's called the Blue and Gold”

“From the looks of this room, I’m willing to bet you are the only one writing for the paper”

“Riverdale’s very own Sherlock Holmes” she says with an over dramatic roll of her eyes.

“So is this you trying to change the subject? Or are we going to continue this conversation about whatever make believe danger you’ve been protecting me for the past seven years?”

“Okay,okay” he says in a sigh “None of this is make believe.That day in the woods I made the biggest mistake and I almost got us both captured by those hunters”

“Hunters?”

“Did you just think it was just an everyday thing for a group of men dressed in all back to go frolicking through the woods? And for said group of men to chase two kids?”

“I’m not stupid, of course i thought it was odd. I just didn’t know they were this big of a threat”

“Those men’s job is to capture people like me, and those who associate with them. I stayed away because I refused to put you in harms way. And then having to deal with the Serpents, I had a lot on my plate”

“Serpents? The boy afraid of clowns is now in a gang?” she says with a soft laugh.

The unamused face in response had her laughing harder.

“Ha Ha. And I still firmly believe that clowns are the absolute worst” the smirk on his face only lasted a few seconds.

“Listen. I had a lot on my plate, I still do, but the best thing I could have done for you was to keep my distance. It was the only way I could have ensured that you, my family, and the Serpents were safe and out of danger”

“And now?”

He sighs as he runs his hands over his face, “nothing can change, there’s been some recent peculiar things happening and I will not put you in the middle of a war you are not even apart of”

“Well at least I’ll know this time around why I’m getting the cold shoulder. It’ll save me from overthinking everything”

“Overthinking what? What did you think I stopped talking to you was?” he asked curiously.

“Oh, I was convinced that you just simply hated my guts for whatever reason” she just shrugged her shoulders and kicked her legs out to stretch.

Jughead felt his stomach drop, so many thoughts came to his mind all at once.As he rises from his chair and is about to tell Betty that he could never possibly hate her the loud shrill of the bell goes off signaling the end of class as well as their conversation. He opens and closes his mouth a couple of times trying to find the right words to say as he watches her collect her things for the next class.

He feels like he is drowning in his thoughts,he wants to tell her that he’s sorry and wants to be friends again and make up for lost time. But then he realizes how selfish that would make him and how in the end it will just lead to heartbreak, pain, and almost certainly death. So here he sits in this dusty classroom, gasping for air.

He watches her eyes scan the desk one final time for any forgotten items and make her way over to him, she won’t hold his gaze for longer than a few minutes. She’s standing close enough to him that he can smell the scent of her hair, and she gently places the paper with his class schedule in front of him.

“I’ll see you around, Jughead” she said so softly that he almost missed it. She makes her way towards the door and as her hand touches the doorknob the sunlight coming through the window hits the scar on her arm, illuminating it. He watches her pause before turning the doorknob and looks over her shoulder and straight into his eyes.

“Goodbye Jughead Jones” she says with a sad smile on her face and after a moment she breaks her gaze and goes through the door and down the hall.

Those three simple words completely wrecked him, It wasn’t just a simple goodbye uttered between two people. This held so much more. This was a goodbye that was seven years in the making. She was saying farewell to him.

And he fucking hated this feeling.

It finally dawned on him just how selfish he has been these past years, yes he didn’t keep in contact with Betty but he would still go and check on her every now and then. He conjured a familiar for her to keep her safe and alert him the second she is in danger. But he left her with absolutely nothing, he just upped and vanished and left her questioning what happened. He feels a headache start to form just behind his left eye, the steady pressure getting stronger and stronger. His only solace he concludes, is that while he did indeed leave Betty all alone he did at least help her with her furry companion.

Betty wants to just go home, she wants to go back to bed and wake up and just have a do-over for this whole damn day. She will admit that it was a relief to actually see that Jughead is alive and well. She would be lying if she said that she didn’t notice how hard and lean he felt when she touched his shoulder in the Blue and Gold office.  
His words keep replaying in her head on a continuous loop,she was left with more questions than answers and she guesses that’s exactly how he wanted it to be. But that final look he gave her she can’t quite shake out of her memory. His eyes held conflicted emotions and Betty was growing more frustrated the longer she thought about it.

She holds her lunch tray loosely as she makes her way towards her usual lunch table, surprised that her friends beat her to the table. She sits down next to Kevin who is practically buzzing in his seat from all the excitement a new school year brings. He leans forward towards Veronica and starts telling her all the new gossip he has heard since the beginning of the day.

After the lunchtime gossip session, Kevin turned his head towards Betty with a smile “so i heard the most scandalous news earlier today” his brown eyes gleaming with amusement.

“I’m sure you did, Kev. But you know I’m not a fan of hallway gossip” she replies coyly.

“Well then, surely you must have an opinion on our newest batch of students. Have any leather wearing boys catch your attention?”

“None that I can think of at the moment”

“Is that so?”

“Mmhmm”

“Well, I just heard the most interesting thing”

“The suspension is seriously killing me right now guys” Veronica sighs out. Leaning closer she raises an eyebrow and commands “spill”

“It was nothing”

“Betty ran off to an empty classroom with a Serpent!” they both said at the same exact time.

“Nothing happened at all, we just had a conversation. We were childhood friends, just catching up”

“Well, from what I heard this mystery boy was hot. So you didn’t jump his bones?”

“God, Kev no”

“But did you want to?” Kevin asked with a wiggle of his eyebrows, a small laugh came from Veronica’s direction.

“I’m just going to ignore that last question” she grumbled as she moves her food around her plate.

“Well I fully support you and this Serpent dude, I bet he’d be all kinds of fantastic in bed” he says wistfully.

“Yeah right, like Betty would ever do something that stupid” Archie scoffed

“What the hell does that even mean?” Betty feels the anger slowly start to bubble inside her.

“You would never let some Southside scum touch you like that”

“Maybe i would, maybe I wouldn't. But one thing is for certain, you get no say in the matter” she says with a powerful tone.

Sitting back in his seat Archie gets comfortable “I’m just saying, with them coming in is going to be all bad news. They are going to bring this whole place down. Just watch”

“Oh please, they are teens just like you and me. The only difference is where they live”

“The difference is that they are criminals and gangbangers” he says with clenched teeth.

“Enough, Arch. This whole Northside is better than Southside is all toxic masculinity bullshit”

She gets up quickly and turns to walk away, she just wanted to get away from the situation and put some distance between herself and Archie. She notices a tiny girl in a leather jacket standing close by. She must of heard us she thinks quickly to herself, she smiles at her and gets a slight nod in return.

Before she knew it, the last bell rang signaling that the school day was over. Betty was relieved that she could finally leave. Her walk was quick and as she took the stairs leading up to her front door, she could hear meowing and sees a flash of a black tail through the window.

Closing the door behind her the meowing grows louder.

“You can stop meowing now, you know” she smiles down “I know you’re hungry”

She sets her backpack on the couch and kicks her shoes off, walking lazily towards the kitchen and to the cabinet that holds the cat food. As soon as she stops at the counter to open the cabinet a black flash jumps and is in front of her on the marble counter.

“Oh, hello” she says looking down, the sound of a deep purr fills the quiet kitchen. The midnight black cat spins twice and then moves up so her front paws are on her chest and her head starts to nuzzle her chin.

“I’ve missed you too, Binx” her hands move down the feline’s back and she starts twirling her tail between her fingers.

With her cat happily eating her food, Betty sips her tea at the kitchen island. Her eyes roamed over the note in front of her, the neat cursive writing all to familiar to her. She rereads the note.

Working late, left some cash for you to get yourself dinner (just don’t over do it) don’t wait up for me.

Betty isn’t even hurt by how distant and cold the note’s words are, she’s used to it. Her mother stopped signing ‘love mom’ a long, long, time ago. She blames her father and older sister for breaking the unbreakable Alice Cooper. The night they left wounded her mother, but the years and years of not so much as a word from them is what truly dimmed her inner light.

Betty’s eyes sweep around the empty house, remembering how alive and full of life it once was. Now it’s just a tomb of a happier time. With her mother’s persistence absence Betty felt like the quietness of this house would drive her mad.

But this house does hold one last glimmer of love for her, this black cat watching her from her food bowl. Somehow as a kitten she found this house, Betty remembers fondly of that morning she meet her. She had nearly stepped over her as she was walking out the front door to school, her fur matched the shade as the doormat. The only thing that stood out was her vibrant golden eyes. And she has been a part of her life ever since that fateful morning.

Betty moves to watch some TV on the couch and relax before it was a reasonable time for her to walk down to Pop’s for dinner. Laying on her back with her feet under a blanket she yawns, the days events had drained her. Binx makes her way over to lay on top of her chest, circling a few times to get the blankets just right. With each turn her long tail would flick Betty right on the face, her nose scrunches from the tickling sensation. Once she was settled she flipped through the channels finally landing on a random channel, she felt her eyes grow heavy and soon she was sleeping.

The feel of whiskers on her face wakes her up with a jump, she looks around the living room and notices that the light outside is dim and she slept much longer than she intended too. Getting up from the couch she stretches her arms high above her head and walks over to put her shoes on. After refilling the water bowl, she grabs her phone and the money left for her on the counter and heads to Pop’s.

Her stomach growls as she waits for her order to be delivered, the smell of milkshakes fill her nose and the low conversations buzz in the background. She makes eye contact with Archie while he's sitting at a different table with the other football players. The older waitress places her food in front of her and she takes a big bite out of her burger.

The town’s sheriff, walks in and takes a seat in the booth next to her. He sits so his back is facing her, she notices the large stack of papers in his hands. Betty couldn’t help but sit a little bit straighter in her seat to try and sneak a glimpse over his shoulder. Once she gets a good view what she reads next is concerning, it seems there has been an influx of missing Southside teens. She tries to read the date on the paper but the Sheriff started to shuffle the papers in his hands, and she caught a few glimpses of what she can only assume are autopsy photos.

An odd combination of emotions overwhelm her. A sense of sadness for these young teens who vanished and for their loved ones who are left with no answers. She also felt angry. Angry that this town can be so cruel to its own people, that people from the Southside are treated like second class citizens. And furious that not even one word has been spoken out loud about these missing teens.

Maybe this was the dangers Jughead was telling her about back in the Blue and Gold room. She can understand why he didn’t want to flat out tell her that a few of our peers have gone missing and their bodies were found days later. But from a quick look at the sheriff’s papers, it seems like all the kids in Riverdale are in trouble.

At that moment she hears the crackle of the Sheriff’s radio, the dispatcher’s voice low came out choppy but she was able to make out a few key words: body, forest and bridge. She notices that the sheriff is not in a rush collecting his papers together, and sees that he has no intention of leaving to investigate until he is finished with his food.

With a scowl on her face towards the poor excuse of a sheriff Betty leaves some money on her table for the food and makes her way out the door. Walking towards the exit she goes over what her next plan of action is, should she just ignore it and let the adults handle the situation? Or should she investigate this on her own? The small ding of the door’s bell makes her decision clear, she was going to look into this and help the Southside.

And her first plan of action is to go for a hike in the forest. With a determined look in her eye she pulls the zipper of her jacket up, and pulls her ponytail tighter and crosses the street and heads into the lush green forest.

As she approaches the old fox forest bridge, she starts to slow her steps. The pale pink converse she’s wearing are damp and her feet start protest against the cold. She can hear a heated conversation off into the distance. A small twig snaps under her feet and in an instance the mood of the forest changes. She can feel the hairs on her arms begin to raise and her pulse quicken. Suddenly the damp ground she was just walking on felt dark and nefarious, it made her stomach clench and twist in protest. The newfound energy of this section of the forest was warning her that something wicked this way comes.

She can hear voices getting louder the closer she gets to the old decrepit wooden bridge, she walks off the trail and makes her way through the thick bushes. Once she has a visual on the men she steadies her feet and sweeps her eyes over the scene in front of her.

She sees four tall men, in head to toe black suits. The shadows cast by the moonlight in the trees keeps their faces hidden. She noticed strange carvings in the trees surrounding the clearing, from the sap she sees leaking from the deep gashes she concludes that they must be fresh. The men are all standing in a makeshift circle with various stones in different sizes and colors surrounds them.

She observes one tall man shuffling his feet around, Betty watches as he moves the earth around to erase the designs that were once there. Betty follows the lines in the dirt and realizes that its in the shape of a pentagram. Two of the other men start to move and work besides the first man. The fourth man, the leader Betty thinks, is standing off to the side watching the men disrupt the intricate designs in the soil.

The three men start to move out towards the different points of the pentagram when Bettys eyes widen, in the middle of where the men had once stood is the lifeless body of a boy about the same age as her. His body is positioned with him bowing his head on the ground with his arms stretched out above his head. All she can see is the matted, clumped black hair on his head and deep slashes across his back in symbols she’s never seen before.

It dawned on Betty that the black soil the four men stood on wasn’t dark due to the rain they had earlier that day, but in fact, darkened by blood. The heavy copper smell of blood lingered heavily in the air, getting stuck in her throat. She can see the red stains on the poor boys ghostly white neck. Without thinking Betty takes a few steps back, forgetting she was supposed to remain silent, she made another twig snap and she gasped audibly at the loud noise it created.

With wide eyes she snapped up to where the men were and sees the leader of the man turn his head directly in her direction. Trying, and failing, to control her breathing she seems the man nod towards the other three and starts to walk over to the direction of the noise. Betty knows her hiding spot is compromised but she is paralyzed with fear, does she run further into the woods and risk getting completely lost? Or stand her ground and try to fight off these strange men.

She lowers herself into a defensive position her hand clenched tightly around her pepper spray when she notices the man approaching is holding something tightly to his side. The moonlight hit the object just faintly and Betty instantly knew what he was holding. A gun. She knew then her only option was to flee and run deeper into the woods, so she moves quickly out of the bushes and starts running as fast and quietly as she could.

Her legs are on fire and she feels herself getting more and more weak the deeper she gets into the woods. The heavy steady boots are getting closer and closer to her and she starts to panic. She realizes that she can’t outrun this man, and she needed to find somewhere to hide. Up ahead she sees a small overgrown trail and decides she will try and run into here and prays that the man in black doesn’t realize she changed her direction.

The dense vegetation on both sides of this small path make Betty feel like she was drowning in a sea of green. She falls to her knees in exhaustion and to give herself a moment to listen to see if the mysterious man in black was still behind her. She closes her eyes and focuses her mind on listening to the steady thump of boots on damp soil. Suddenly she hears a large branch snap not too far behind her, she quickly scrambles up to her feet and run further down the path.

The large plants hits her arms and she is grateful she is wearing a jacket, the branches that get past her arms snap her face. She can feel the red welts forming on her cheeks, she brushes her hair that has fallen out of her ponytail out of her eyes when she feels something wet. Bringing her hand down she sees that she is bleeding, she quickly wipes the blood on her jeans and continues forward.

Betty quickly looks over her shoulder and she can see the man right behind her, his face still hidden by the shadows. The only thing she can hear from him is his strong footsteps, she turns to look forward and pushed her exhausted legs to move even faster than before.

Then she feels it, a strong hand brushes against her back, shit she panics as her legs move forward. She knows she can’t possibly outrun him and now he is too close to her to find a proper hiding spot. This is it she thinks solemnly to herself, her lungs begin to burn from her laboured breaths. Tears spill from her eyes that mix with the sweat dripping from her temples, her chest heaving she closes her eyes to try and stop the sting in them.

A hidden vine catches her feet and Betty falls hard onto the cold damp ground, the force of the fall causes her to lose her breath. She hears a low rumble of a laugh behind her that causes her blood to run cold and sends her quickly back to her feet. The pounding in her ears is deafening, she knows she only has a few more seconds before she's captured.

Her arm starts to tingle that quickly turns into a burning sensation, a loud yelp leaves her mouth as the pain radiates up her arm. Her vision starts to get fuzzy around the edges as she tries to calm her breathing. A thick wall of plants is in front of her, she knows she won’t be able to get through this quick enough. She knows this is the end. Still she claws her way in, making little headway she can feel the tall man’s dark presence behind her.

A deathly cold hand reaches and grabs her arm and with a tight against her jagged scar, all she could think about was how utterly wrong it felt.. A deep guttural “no!” twisted its way out of her mouth at the same time a searing white hot pain manifests from her scar. A bright flash of blue light burst from her fingertips and moves like a tidal wave towards the dangerous man. The force of the mysterious burst sent Betty flying backwards through the wall of plants she was trying to get through mere moments ago. As she landed on her back she noticed how the stars above her were twinkling innocently back at her, she couldn’t help but think how beautiful it was.

A sting from her arm caused her to blink and bring her out of the trance she was in. She lets out a hiss as she moves her sore body over to stand up. She looks around and sees that she is, somehow, in the middle of a fork in the hiking trails. Confused she looks around and can’t understand where that small path she just came from is. As she tries to gather her bearings she can hear footsteps and hushed voices approaching her.

Thinking it must be the men from earlier, she starts to stumble forward. The throbbing pain in her left ankle causes her eyes to sting with tears, sniffling them back she pushes her way towards the bend in the hiking trail in front of her. Blinking back tears she’s not looking in front of her as she makes the turn, suddenly colliding with a strong warm body. The force of the impact made her knees buckle as she clutches to the soft fabric, she feels strong arms wrapped around her to keep her upright.

“Betty?!” a panicked voice breaks the silence “what happened? Did someone do this to you?”

Betty instantly knew the voice belonged to Jughead, a shiver ran down her spine as she buries her face into the soft shirt he's wearing. She tries to control her breathing to tell him everything that happened tonight but her body is still heaving trying to get a full breath of air. She begins to feel faint and she couldn’t get her eyes to focus.

On the brink of falling into the black veil, Betty managed to whimper out a soft “Juggie” before her body fell limp.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, would love to talk in comments or if Tumblr is more your jam come chat with me over there 😘


	4. Chapter 4

The pounding in Jughead’s head was growing as the shouts inside the smokey bar grew higher and higher. A meeting was being held inside the Whyte Wyrm to discuss the missing teens from the Southside. An invisible line was drawn on the dirty floor of the bar, with Jughead and the younger serpents on one side and his father and the older crew on the other. Jughead watches the condensation run down his beer bottle as he listens to people’s suggestions on what our plan of action is.

“We need to go to the Northside and start asking around. Use force if necessary, we all know they must be behind this” Tall Boy’s booming voice quieting the room. He stands up from the barstool he was sitting on and looks across the room “We all know how much the Northside hates us on the Southside. It’s time we stop letting them walk all over us, and take a stand”

A tutt of annoyance from the other side of the bar was loud and made Tall Boy turn his head quickly towards the noise “One of you  got something to say?” His small eyes watch as Jughead confidently rises from his seat. “You have no evidence that the Northside is even behind any of this. Why cause any more trouble on top of everything else we are dealing with?” Tall boy crosses his arms “And what do you suggest we do? Lay low while more kids keep disappearing? Or maybe we can try some more of your protection charms, since they seem to be working so well” his sarcastic tone made Jughead clench his teeth.

Jughead crosses his arms to mimic Tall Boys stance and squares his shoulders, he feels his magic flare as his patience wears thin. “We need to be smart about this. Ask around to see if anyone has seen anything, look in the woods for any clues. Whoever is behind this had to have left something behind” Jughead starts walking across the room, his confidence commanding the attention of the other Serpents. “From now on we need to all be safe, everyone needs to travel in pairs or groups. We need to reinforce our protection charms and check the ones throughout town to see if any of them have been tampered with. No open magic, keep it to indoors or during the night. I think we need to sco-”

“Oh, you’ve got to be shitting me. No open magic now? Why do you insist we be scared of our power? To cower in the shadows?” Tall Boy interrupts with a shout.

Jughead rubbed his temples to try and soothe the throb in his head “it’s not cowering in the shadows Tall Boy, it’s being smart and not putting our magic on full display for the whole town to see”  He walks over to the table he was sitting at and looks at his friends who were still sitting there, looking at each one for silent approval from them. After the last confirmation from Sweet Pea, Jughead leans back against the table and crosses his feet “we need to be safe to protect ourselves, our loved ones and the Southside. All these disappearing teens have one thing in common, they are all on the brink of coming into their magic. So, to me, that means there can only be two people behind all this. The first one is we are dealing with a solitary witch, a lone witch trying to steal others magic to gain power”  

Jughead takes a deep drink from his beer, pausing before saying his second suspicion. He knows once he makes the statement the other older members were going to be upset and the shouting was going to get worse than earlier. With a big sigh he begins “now who I really believe is behind this is the witch hunters” Jughead looks across the bar and watches Tall Boy’s face turns to a deep red “and why would you even think that? Besides to cause panic, we haven’t had to deal with hunters with years. What makes you think all of a sudden they would be back?”

Before the shouting started again between the two sides of the bar, a booming voice overcame the bar “enough, Tall Boy. The hunters are always going to be a threat, it’s true that we haven’t had to deal with them for a while but we need to always keep them in the back of our minds” FP takes a long gaze around to look at the other members before speaking again, “The hunters could very well be back, they may have been waiting until our coven got bigger before striking again. We need to be vigilant and  be smart”

After the murmurs around the bar quieted down, FP walks over to the bar and pours himself a drink. Running a hand over his face, he looks over the crowd in front of him “starting tomorrow we need a group to go around town and start asking questions to see if anyone has seen anything” a few hands shoot up, both old and young members and FP nods his head in acknowledgement.  

“Right, now tomorrow i’m sending out Tall Boy and Penny to go look at our protection charms. Make sure none have been tampered with and reinforce them all” Jughead opens his mouth to protest but the look FP gives makes him close his mouth and glare at Tall Boy’s direction.  “Tonight Jug and a few others will patrol the woods and look for any clues or see if there is anything odd out there. We need enough people for two groups to go, cover more space” FP locks eyes with Jughead and gives him a firm nod.

After FP’s speech the other members go back to talking among themselves, more drinks were poured and a few games of pool were started. The atmosphere around the bar had lifted slightly after the Serpent King’s commands, but the concerned hushed conversations and worried eyes around the bar told a different story.

Turning around in his seat to face the people sitting at his table, Jughead looks around and asks “so whos in to come patrol tonight?” Toni, Sweet Pea and Joaquin all nod their heads yes to Jughead’s question. The table next to them all agreed to join them as the second group to help with their watch. Jughead turns down the offer to a game of pool from Sweet Pea and watched his friends leave the table and go over towards the pool tables. Setting his now empty beer bottle down on the table he gets up and heads towards the stairs leading up to his apartment He needed some peace and quiet away from the noisy bar before going out.

While putting his key into his apartment door, Jughead hears a frantic shuffling on the other side. He pauses his movement to see if he can hear voices to go along with the noise, after a moment he turns the knob and pushes the door open. He pauses in the doorway at the sight before him, there in the middle of the room he sees a black fluffy cat walking in worried circles.

“Well, how did you manage to find your way into here?” he asks while walking inside and closing the door behind him. A clipped single meow was all he was answered with. Smiling he notices he left his window open above his desk, a few loose papers scattered the floor as a result from the furry intruder. Bending down to pick up the papers the cat moves in front of him and sits right on top of the paper he was beginning to grab. Jughead stills as he gazes into the feline’s green eyes, a chill goes down his spine as the realization hits him. This wasn’t some common housecat that stumbled inside, this was the protector he summoned in the woods many years ago.

The only reason she would seek out Jughead was because of Betty, so on all fours in front of the cat he asks “is betty hurt? Is she in danger?” he pauses a moment as if wanting for the animal in front of him to begin speaking. Shaking his head slightly he asks “where is she?” he watches the cat jump up to the desk once again and looks out the window towards the line of trees. “Ok, so she’s in the woods and in danger. Did someone take her?” he watches the cat turn around and give him an annoyed gaze. “Right. Of course you wouldn’t let someone just take her. So she went into the woods on her own?” he gets a loud meow in response to his question and watches the cat jump down from the desk with a loud bump.

The fluffy cat walks over to him and begins her worried circles once again, Jughead reaches a hand over and begins to pet her “don’t worry, i’ll find her” a soft purr begins to fill the quiet apartment. Jughead’s fingers touch the cat’s collar and he moves it around a little to reach the nametag, the name he reads on the shiny metal makes him chuckle “Binx. I shouldn’t be surprised” the purring stops and the feline turns to face Jughead head on, as if about to challenge him on her name. “I like it, it’s fitting” he says, with laughter in his eyes. An irritated flick of Binx’s tail hits Jughead’s cheek as she makes her way up to the desk and out the window.

He stands up from the floor and walks over his desk chair and picks up his leather jacket, putting it on as he walks out the door. Walking up the pool table he laughs at the sight before him, Sweet Pea is leaning with a sour look on his face as Toni lines up her shot. As the ball drops into the hole, signalling the end of the game, a chorus of cheers and laughs begin.

“Aww, poor little Sweet Pea, maybe better luck next time” Toni says with a giant smirk on her face,

“I’m still convinced you cheated”

“I wouldn’t need to cheat, you’re just awful at pool Sweets”

“Yeah, sure, whatever” Sweet Pea says while handing Toni and crisp twenty dollar bill

“Pleasure doing business with you”  

After the transaction was complete Jughead cleared his throat. “Now that Sweets is done embarrassing himself, it’s time to head out” an anxious feeling starts to overcome him “we need to move fast”

After sending the second group off to go patrol their side of the forest, Jughead can’t seem to shake the anxious feeling away. Walking through the woods his eyes scanned his surroundings for anything out of the ordinary, or for any signs of Betty. Hot Dog, his familiar, is leading the small group weaving them in and out between the trees. A sense of dread crosses Jughead’s mind, making him feel on edge.

Hot Dog leads them down an old hiking trail and Jughead’s pulse quickens. He looks around at the others in the group to see if they are feeling the same as he, and doesn’t notice anything besides the quiet calm exhibiting from all of them. Walking further down the trail a strangled gasp rips out of Jughead’s throat, startling the others in their tracks. “What the hell is going on, Jones?” Toni speaks first. “I don’t know, we need to keep going” Jughead chokes off with tears in his eyes.

The group picks up their pace and Hot Dog barks and starts darting off in front of them. “Something weird is going on in the woods tonight, the whole place just seems unbalanced somehow” Sweet Pea says as he shivers. “I can feel it too, like it’s in distressed” Joaquin responds in a quiet voice. Jughead’s skin begins to tingle from head to toe, causing him to flex his hands to try and control this onslaught of emotions.

The group starts to pick up their pace once they realize that Hot Dog was out of their sight and no one could hear his barks. “Where the hell did he go?” Sweet Pea huffs out, looking around. “If we knew sweets, we wouldn’t be running right now” Jughead replies with a roll of his eyes. “He’s probably off chasing a squirrel and we are running around like a bunch of fools” Toni says as she comes to a stop from running “we need to stop running, we need to be looking for anything out of the ordinary” The others stop after Toni to catch their breath and look around, off in the distance a soft blue light can be seen and just as quickly the light disappeared.

They picked up their pace towards the mysterious blue light, making sure to not make too much noise to blow their cover. As they get closer to where the blue light was, Jughead see any evidence of footprints or any sign of someone behind the magic. Toni and Sweet Pea were having a hushed argument over which spell would cause that shade of blue light, just as Jughead was about to turn around to tell them both to be quiet he collided with a small body.

The small hum in his body gave him the answer of who just ran into him before he even looked down. Once the initial shock was gone Jughead looked down and concern washed over his body, there in his arms Betty looked like she had just fought for her life. Her face was slightly dirty with visible tear tracks running down her flushed cheeks, her hair was disheveled and half out of her ponytail. He noticed a few drops of blood on her shirt and quickly looked at her face for the source, he saw a few small cuts along her cheekbones. “Betty?!” his voice tinged with panic as he searches her face and hands for more wounds “what happened? Who did this to you?”

He doesn’t get a response from her, instead she just wraps her arms around him tightly. He wraps his arms around her small frame and closes his eyes, relief flooding through him now that he knows she’s safe hands. He waits a few moments for her to calm her breathing down in order to talk and explain everything that has happened. He unwraps his arms around her and takes a step back to look at her face, just as he was about to ask her again what happened she sways slightly as a soft “juggie”escapes her lips before she completely collapses in his arms.

“What the hell” Sweet Pea’s voice breaks the silence between the group

“Who did this to her?” Toni says softly, stepping closer to Jughead “poor thing looks like she’s been put through the ringer” she says while moving a piece of hair out of Betty’s face.

“She’s tough though” Sweet Pea moves closer to the group “look at her hands, she fought the bastards that tried to hurt her”

Jughead moves Betty around a bit so he can lift her up easily, while in his arms her arm falls and the glow from her arms catches the attention of everyone. The scar on her arm is glowing a soft blue color, slightly pulsing in color as the light slowly fades. Jughead moves her arm back into place and turns to start walking back out the woods.

“So, I’m guessing from the color of her arm, she’s the one who caused that blue light we all saw” Sweet Pea says while stepping in line with Jughead.

“How come you never said that Betty Cooper was a witch, Jug” Toni asks with an odd look on her face.

“She isn’t a witch, Toni” Jughead huffs out. “I’ve known her all my life, she’s never showed any signs. Plus, she would have told me about it when we were younger”

“Well, there's no other way she could be behind that blue light we’ve seen unless she’s a witch” the petite pink haired girl says knowingly.

“We don’t know shit, Toni. If she was a witch, the elders would of known and told us about her” his tone clipped and final. Getting closer to the end of the trail Hot Dog ran out from the bushes and joined the group. He walked up next the Jughead and let out a loud whine, moving in front of him and sniffing louding towards Betty in his arms.

Walking up towards the Whyte Wyrm Jughead braces himself for all the questions that were going to be thrown his way. Walking into the bar, all the talking stopped abruptly and everyone’s eyes were trained on him. He nods to Sweet Pea on his right side and he begins to make his way towards FP’s booth to fill him in on what happened to them. Jughead and Toni make their way up towards the stairs and Toni opens the door for him.

Jughead places Betty as gently as he could on his bed, lifting her up slightly to move the pillow before laying her head down. Toni walks back into the room with a wet washcloth and moves towards the foot of the bed to begin removing Bettys shoes. A loud knock is heard from the front door and Jughead walks over to answer it, FP is standing in front of him with unreadable eyes. Jughead steps out and follows his father down the hall and towards the meeting room.

As soon as he closes the door behind him FP’s voice broke the silence “care to explain to me what the hell happened in those woods tonight?” he moves to sit at the head of the table “what Sweet Pea just told me, seemed too far fetched” Jughead moves to the seat closest to him “I don't know what to tell you dad, I'm just glad we were there to find her though”

“I’m sure you are, Boy”

“Dad, don’t” Jughead says with a sigh. “She passed out before she could tell us what happened, as soon as she wakes up I’ll get her to tell us and I promise I will let you know. But for the time being, I’m going to take a shower and go to sleep. Night dad” just as he was about to walk completely out of the door, Jughead looks back and see his dad watching him with a look in his eyes that he couldn’t decipher.

He walks back into his apartment and sees a clean faced Betty tucked in his bed, and sees Toni sitting on the couch looking at her phone. She looks up as he walks in and gets up from her spot “I cleaned her up a bit and got her into some clean clothes, I put her dirty ones in the washer, so don’t forget to switch it over once the cycle is done” she gives Hot Dog a goodbye pet “thank you, Toni” he says, grateful for all her help. “No problem at all, Jones” she replies over her shoulder as she walks out the door.

Jughead looks around the room as he shrugs off his leather jacket and drapes it over his desk chair, he throws Hot Dog a treat on his dog bed as he walks towards the bathroom for a shower. After a much needed shower, he could barely keep his eyes open. He walks over to the linen closet and pulls out a pillow and blanket for the couch, walking back into the main area of his place he is greeted yet again from a furry little intruder.

Binx is standing on the bed, staring concerned at Betty’s sleeping form. Hot Dog was sitting at the side of the bed with his head laying right next to the cat, letting out a small whine. Jughead walks over and drops the blanket and pillow on the couch and walks over to  give the dog’s ears a scratch to ease his tension, Binx looks over and gives him a quiet meow. Walking away from the animals he moves towards the couch to set up his makeshift bed, just as he was about to lay down he hears his phone ring. Walking over he sees he has a new text message and opens to read

Toni: _Don’t forget to switch the laundry, Jones._

The laugh that escapes Jughead was louder than he intended, he looks over quickly to the bed and noticed the nose didn’t stir Betty and he sighs a bit in relief. He walks over to the washing machine and quickly throwing the wet clothes into the dryer, making sure to throw in a couple extra dryer sheets. Once everything was done he walks over to the lone lamp and flips the switch, walking his way to the couch he lets out a loud sigh as he laid down and his head hit the soft cool pillow.

He hears Hot Dog make his way over to his dog bed, only tripping over a pair of shoes on his way. Jughead smiles as he thinks of his often clumsy familiar. He hears a soft thud come from the bed and hears delicate steps get closer to him, the sudden weight on his chest catches him slightly off guard. Binx is sitting directly on his chest, yellow eyes staring directly into his “I guess I can’t call you little one anymore” he can feel the claws in Binx’s paws start to apply pressure to his chest “okay, okay. I’m sorry” he says quickly and thankfully feels the claws retract.

He moves a hand slowly to give her soft ears a scratch “I told you I would find her” she responds with a soft purr “I was worried too, but I’m glad she’s safe now. I know you are too” he moves his hand down to lay by his side and Binx moves forward and gives him a slight head bump. A light chuckle fills the dark apartment and he watches Binx jump down from the couch and make her way to rest right on top of Betty's back.

The light from the window illuminates Betty’s face in a hauntingly beautiful way, Jughead thinks to himself. His eyes take in every small detail of her face, to the slight freckles that dust her cheeks to the small mole on her jawline. _She’s beautiful_ he thinks to himself. He shakes his head to stop his train of thoughts and thinks back to the task at hand tomorrow morning. The loud purrs from Binx fills the apartment and lulls his eyelids to close.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi
> 
> sorry I've been m.i.a for a bit, I'm back from vacation and getting back into the swing of things.
> 
> also sorry for the kinda short chapter, I've been feeling guilty for not posting a new one in awhile
> 
> hope you enjoy this chapter, working on the next one already :)

    The soft morning sunlight coming through the windows curtains warms Betty’s face, humming in contentment she turns to her side and hugs the fluffy comforter. Burying her nose into the soft cotton of the pillow she inhales the intoxicating smell of fresh laundry and _boy._ She furrows her brows after a moment, realizing that the bed she’s in currently is much bigger than her own. With her face still smooshed into the pillow she wills her brain to lift from it’s sleepy daze, so she can get to the bottom of how she wound up in such a heavenly bed. Her body tenses once the realization hits her of last night’s events wash over her. 

         The woods. 

         The blood soaked earth.

          Fighting her way through the thick vines. 

         The man in black.

         Pain.

         Bright blue light. 

         Twinkling stars. 

         Jughead.

         Darkness.

    With her eyes still closed, Betty tried to control her breathing as last night began to flash behind her eyes. _It’s okay, your safe_ she kept reminding herself as her breathing became less and less laboured. Calming down, the subtle ache in her body started to make its presence known. Flexing her toes under the soft sheets, voices start to filter into Betty’s ears. Muffled by the thick sheets over her head, she couldn’t make out the words that were spoken. Contemplating how much longer she could get away with pretending to sleep, the smell of fresh coffee helped make her decision. 

    Lifting the sheets away from her, she welcomed the cool air that instantly hit her. Arching her back as she stretched her entire body, a small hiss left her lips as her sore muscles protested the movements. She rubbed her legs together during her stretch she froze in panic, ler legs were bare and not in the jeans she knows she was wearing in the woods last night. Sitting up in bed she looks down and sees that she now wearing an oversized sleepshirt, she rubs the fabric between her two fingers and notices how soft it felt. Her cheeks feel incredibly hot as she tries to figure out how she got to this point of undress. Before she could stew too much over it, a loud bark caught her attention, moving her head towards the noise the sight that awaited her brought a smile to her face. 

    Jughead had his back to her, mug of coffee in his hands and a big shaggy dog was running excited circles around him. Her smile grew big as she recognized the big black eyes hidden behind white fringe, Hot Dog has definitely grown since the last time she saw him. Her smile grows bigger as she watches Hot Dog run around and crash into the kitchen cabinets and whatever else that is slightly near him. She’s glad to see that the only difference with him is his size and he was still the clumsy goofball she fondly remembers. 

    “Calm down, you big oaf” she hears Jughead murmur fondly, “you know the drill, you gotta sit for a treat” he sets his mug down on the kitchen counter and gives the dog an expectant look. Hot Dog tried his best to sit down but couldn’t seem to control his excitement, the wiggling of his bum moved faster with each slight movement of the hand holding his treat. Shaking his head with a smile on his face he kneels down and gives the treat to the eager dog. 

    Moving the sheets completely off of her  Betty moves her feet towards the edge of the bed when she noticed a black cat jump on top of the countertop. _How peculiar,_ Betty thinks to herself as she watches the cat walk over to the mug and stuff it’s head inside. As she’s staring at the cat she sees the familiar yellow metal crescent moon hanging from it’s collar. “Binx?” she asks loudly without thinking beforehand and Jughead jumps from his spot at the sudden voice, Jughead  turns around quickly with wide eyes. Behind him Binx looks up from the mug with some fur on her face wet from the coffee and Hot Dog sitting with his head tilted to one side. 

    “Good morning” Jughead says nervously running his hands through his hair.

 “How is my cat here?” she asks confused, she watches Jughead look around nervously “she kind of just showed up last night” 

    Her face scrunches up as she tries to figure out how that could even be possible, before she could dwell on that for long her lap is full with Binx. Running her hands through the long soft fur and the loud pur filling the room Betty’s anxiety slowly ebbed away. Sensing the tension in the air being lifted Hot Dog started a mad dash towards the bed, tongue hanging out and tail wagging. Distracted from her lap full of fur and failed attempts of dodging Hot Dog’s kisses she didn’t notice Jughead moving towards her until a plate is set on the nightstand. Once the smell of pancakes fills her nose, her stomach makes a loud rumble.

    “Eat up” Jughead chuckles, setting a fork and knife on the bed next to her

    “Thanks” she smiles weakly, “you really didn’t need to make me anything” she reaches over for the plate and begins eating. 

    She looks around at the surprisingly tidy room when her eyes land on a pile of neatly folded clothes that Betty instantly recognized as her own. “How did you get those?” she questions, pointing her fork full of buttery pancakes in the pile’s general direction. At the wide eye look on Jughead’s face, Betty arches an eyebrow “I know I wasn’t wearing that last night in the woods”  she takes a sip of coffee from her mug, “so what gives, Jones?”

    Before he had a chance to speak there was a loud knock at the front door, relieved, Jughead walks over to answer.Betty catches a glimpse of Sweet Pea in the doorway, but noticed that Jughead purposely blocked him from fully entering.  Nearly finished with her breakfast, Betty’s head snaps over to the door when she heard the urgent hushed whispers between the two serpents. Setting her fork and knife gently on the plate, so not to get caught snooping, Betty leans towards the door and tries to hear a snippet of their conversation. 

    “This is bad, Jones” Sweet Pea’s worried voice had the hair on Betty’s arm stand straight.

    “I know, Sweets” Jughead sighs out, “but we will figure this out, we always do” he runs one hand through his hair.

    “But what if-” 

    “No” Jughead puts a hand up to halt his friend from speaking, “we’ll talk more about this at the meeting after school” he places a reassuring hand on the taller serpent’s shoulder. “In unity, there’s strength” 

    “In unity, there’s strength” Sweet Pea nods, still looking apprehensive. “Is sleeping beauty awake yet?” he asks trying to sneak a peek over Jughead’s shoulder. 

    “Just hand the vials over, Sweets” 

    Betty watched as Sweet Pea rolled his eyes at Jughead and hand over two small glass vials over to him. Before turning and leaving the threshold Sweet Pea caught her eyes and a wide smile replaced his earlier worried features. 

    “Pea, go, now” Jughead gritts out, slightly shoving him out of the doorway.

    Betty couldn’t help but laugh at the scene in front of her, not wanting to annoy Jughead any more she simply waved at Sweet Pea as he was leaving, laughing at Pea as he waggled his eyebrows making fun of him.

    Once the door was shut Betty watched as Jughead walked over to the bed and dropped the two small glass bottles on top of the comforter by her feet. Curious, she picked them up and held them up towards the early morning sunlight coming in from the opened window. She watched the liquid move it’s way inside the bottle at a sluggish pace.

    “What is this, exactly?” she asked as she watched the different colors reflecting off the glass.

    “Oh, it’s a salve” he begins to explain, sitting down on a chair 

“why?”

“It’s to help with...you know” he begins to point at his face, “for the cuts”

“Oh” she lifts her hand to her cheekbone and feels the tenderness, “I almost forgot about that” she lowers her hand “thanks”

“Do you remember everything from last night?” he begins to lace up his boots

“Bits and pieces” she begins to open one of the vials and a wonderful aroma quickly fills her nose, “this smells amazing, what is it?” 

“Lemme see” he lifts from the chair and kneels next to her by the bed. 

His fingers brushed against hers taking the glass bottle, “this is the geranium salve” he brings it closer to his nose, “it helps soothe sore muscles”

Betty hums in appreciation.

“And this one” he reaches for the second glass, “is the lavender stuff for your cuts” 

“ why did Sweet Pea have them?”

“Oh…” he gets up and walks over to his desk, “he made them, it’s kind of like his speciality” 

“So like, potions and stuff?” 

“Just stop, Betty” he sighs, “we’re not having this conversation” 

“Why not?!” she rises from the bed, “I already know the secret”

“You think you know, but you don’t” he walks away from the desk, “this is dangerous, Betty, and I won’t drag you into this”

“Let me be the one to decide that” she moves to face him, “something happened in the woods when we were younger, Jughead, there’s no point in trying to play stupid”

“What do you mean?” 

“Ever since that day, this scar” she raises her arm to show him, “will tingle randomly, turn hot or cold, and more recently burn a bright blue color” she lowers her arms. “I’ve never seen that blue color before, the first time was on the first day of school when we saw each other in the hallway”

“Betty” he begins to walk towards her, “I didn’t know” he reaches for her arm.

“If you don’t tell me what’s going on” she moves her arm out of his reach, “I will find out on my own” 

Jughead sighs and locks eyes with Betty, she can see his eyes swimming with uncertainty

“Okay” he finally says defeated, “I don’t know much about the scar” he points towards her forearm, “but we can do some research, ask around” he pinches the bridge of his nose, “just please, don’t repeat what you did last night”

“Oh!” her eyes widen, “about last night, there was-” 

“No, wait” Jughead interrupts her, “we don’t have time for any of this” 

“What? Why” 

“We gotta get going, we’re already late” 

“Shit” she gasped, “how did I forget school?”

“I never thought I’d see the day…” he teases as Betty walks to the chair holding her clothes

“Wait” he holds up his arm to stop Betty from making a mad dash to the bathroom to change, “when we are at school, you need to keep your distance” 

“Don’t be stupid” 

“You can’t get mixed up with the southside” 

“You can’t be serious right now”

“Listen” he sighs, “the body of a Northsider was found in the woods this morning” he holds up his hand to stop Betty from speaking, “no, it wasn’t the same boy you saw” he paused for a moment looking around the room before landing back to Betty. “Rumours are already floating around that a Southersider is responsible  for the death, so that means the Serpents need to lay low. Having you being seen with us is too risky, it’ll put too much heat on you. And I-I won’t allow that, Betty”

Betty takes a moment to let the information Jughead just unloaded onto her settle before looking up at him. Biting her lower lip she simply nods her head and steps towards the bathroom to get ready, with each step she takes her heartbeat quickens. Closing the door behind her she pressed her back to the wood and closes her eyes, steadying her breath she prepares for the day ahead of her. 

Pushing herself off the door and towards the sink she finally sees the cuts on her face from last night. Her eyes trace the angry red lines on her cheekbone as she opens the vial and dips some ointment onto her finger, a small hiss escaped her lips as the salve makes contact with the wounds. Staring at her reflection in the smudged bathroom mirror Betty makes a vow that she will find out all she can about the man in black, and put an end to whatever malevolent plans he has. 

_But first,_ she thinks to herself, _gotta survive this school day._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come tumble with me!  
> https://lanadeljones.tumblr.com/
> 
> xoxo-m

**Author's Note:**

> Any comment or kudos would be so appreciated!
> 
> you can also find me on Tumblr if you wanna chat!


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